Reflection
by Crazy13Faith
Summary: Ginny reflects on her life the night after her 30th birtday party.


Reflection  
  
Disclaimer: Harry Potter and his world belong to J.K. Rowling, Warner Bros, and all proper publishing companies both European and American. Any ideas that I happen to have used that are not expressly used in the books, are mine. Any characters mentioned that are not used in the Harry Potter series are mine as well. Although, if J.K. Rowling wishes to use them, I've no quelms. *grin*  
  
Author's Note: This idea came to me after writing a chapter in HPatOotP (yes, I do like abriviations). Anyhow, it's Ginny's thoughts on her 30th birthday. Remenisings, you know. I did steal Grace and Faith from myself and use them in this story, but I'm not quite sure why, other than the fact that I really wanted Ginny to have a best friend. I don't know why, but I'm not one of those people who thinks Ginny and Hermione are going to become best mates. It just doesn't fit for me. In fact, that was my origional reason for creating Grace. In all reality, Grace wasn't born for HPatOotP until about a week before I decided to write it. She was created strictly as Ginny's best friend... and then she took on a life of her own. Enjoy.  
  
*** "But I am somebody... I am me. I like being me, and I need nobody to make me somebody. I need no setting. As for a home, I can build my own. As for position, each of us finds his own." Louis L'amour, Comstock Lode ***  
  
After that year I was never the same. After that year, no one was the same. We all changed, in completely different ways. They say you reflect on your thirtieth birthday, and that's true. As I sit here amidst the wrapping paper, dying fire, glasses, plates and napkins, I remember the things that shaped my life. The things that changed it forever.  
  
The first change that I remember was when I was ten. I never had much of a memory, to tell you the truth. It was the day Ron went off to Hogwarts for the first time. The day I first saw Harry Potter. He was a little shrimp of a thing to be honest, and I should know. Growing up with six brothers, all of whom were good size, I knew a shrimp when I saw one. (They were usually the ones my brothers were trying to keep from being beaten up.) Anyway, he was a shrimp. He was short, barely taller than me, with this mop of black hair that you could tell he tried to keep down, but never would stay in place, then he was wearing these glasses that weren't even held together with spell-o-tape, but with regular Muggle tape. And behind those glasses were one thing that made up for every single thing he seemed to be lacking. The most beautiful green eyes I had ever seen in my entire exsistance. And I had seen a few. My oldest brother, Bill, his eyes are green, but they aren't emerald green, they aren't... Harry green. It wasn't for another ten minutes or so that I found out he was Harry Potter. The Harry Potter. And I hadn't even needed to know that to fall in love with him.  
  
The next change of course, was my first year, when I turned into a bumbling idiot around Harry. Running from the room, squeeling. Running into things. Hiding in my bedroom. And that terribly embaressing ordeal with the butter dish. Things hadn't gotten better after that. I'd found Tom Riddle's diary, which had lead to imminent danger, causing not only my own life to be in danger, but every Muggleborn in the school's, as well as Harry's. Who was suddenly not only this boy I loved from afar. He was my hero. A boy who had risked his life for me even though he didn't know me. To this day I still don't understand why at least one person didn't get upest with me. Why one person didn't yell at me. But they didn't. My parents understood and so did my brothers. Hermione and Harry both understood along with everyone else who was petrified. It's still kind of shocking, and that was nearly twenty years ago. From then on, I had tried to work Harry into conversations with Ron, very carefully, learning about the real Harry, and not storybook Harry.  
  
Then there was second year. When Harry first ran off, I was scared to death. Of course it was mainly because I was having nightmares that he would be caught by Sirius Black, but it was partially because he was alone. Ron and Hermione wrote to him all the time, Ron even wrote in the occasional "Ginny says Hi!" but that was it to be truthful. Whenever he was with those terrible relatives of his he was completely alone. And for those few dreadful hours that his wear abouts were unknown to all, I was in hell and couldn't tell anyone. That whole year was misery for me. I knew that Harry couldn't keep himself out of trouble if he tried, and Ron certainly wasn't much of a help. Sure, Ron knew that Sirius Black was a convicted murderer, and eventually knew that he was also the one to supposedly give away Harry's parents to Voldemort, but that didn't stop the idiot from letting Harry go gallavanting off to Hogsmead through secret passages (that at the time I hadn't known exsisted) and off to visit Hagrid in the middle of the night. Despite my fear of how lonely he was at the Dursley's, at least I knew he was safe. And let's think about this, lonely is a hell of a lot better than dead, especially when you're talking about someone you love.  
  
My third year was Harry's fourth. Yes, I realize that my life seems to revolve around Harry, but that's how is was, you see. Anyhow, that was Harry's year from hell. He was the fourth champion you see, he was set up. Set up to be killed. I didn't learn that my suspicions had been correct until a few weeks before I was a fourth year, but I eventually found out. If I thought the previous year had been bad, it was nothing compared to what I went through that year. Colin continually told me that I was being a worry-wart and that Harry would come out okay and in the end he was almost right. Voldemort had come back into his body and Harry was hurt, but not dead. Thank Goddess he wasn't dead. Ron and Hermione had been as frantic as I. Mum of course made me stay in the bleachers when he first disappeared. I wanted to go down to the field so badly, but Mum made us all stay. So she sent Bill down to talk to Dumbledore. Bill got to tell us that Harry and Cedric Diggory were missing. I couldn't even cry like I had in first year after Tom and the Chamber. I had a really bad feeling, that things were changing more than they ever had. Hermione had cried quietly the whole time and Ron kept mumbling that everything would be okay. I had always known Ron was a moron, but I didn't realize that he could go into denial so quickly. Upon Harry's arrival, more crying had happened, but I felt better. I know it's terrible, I knew it then and I know it now, but I did. I felt better because Harry was still alive, and I didn't have to cry anymore. Then, of course, Mum wouldn't let me go to the hospital wing. Not that she stopped me or anything. I didn't learn anything she did that night, I didn't learn anything that anyone did, but I was there. I sat outside that hospital wing for a very long time. No one saw me except for Professor Dumbledore, and he didn't send me to bed. He just nodded gravely and handed me his cloak. There I sat, in an oversized cloak, for nearly six hours, and I don't think many people noticed I was gone. Eventually, once everyone who had been in the hospital wing had left (I didn't learn until much later who all it had been) did Dumbledore tell me I could go in for a few moments, but to please not wake Harry. I snuck into that room as quietly as I had into any of my brother's after a nightmare. They never even knew I was there when I was little, it wasn't until I had accidently tripped over one of Fred and George's Wheezes that they figured out I'd been doing things like that for years. But Harry didn't wake up because I didn't trip. I was quiet as a cat as I snuck to the bed side and kneeled quietly on the floor. He was ghost white that night. He had never been and never would be as pale as he was that night. "You'll be all right, Harry," I whispered. "You'll be okay, because you always are. You always pull out of these things, that's what makes you, you. You're ability to still be you when it's all over," my voice never raised an octive, but I sometimes think he heard that part, even if it wasn't what I wanted him to hear. What I wanted him to hear, but was terrified he would, was what I said next. What I said next changed more things for me than anything probably ever would. "And I love you. You'll never love me, I know that. And get this through your head, mister. Loving you may be stupid, and childish and dangerous, and futile, but I will never stop. Not as long as I live, understand?" Of course he made no indication that he understood, he was gone someplace where nothing could hurt him, so there was no way he could have understood, but maybe, inside his comatose like sleep, he did.  
  
After that night, everything else seemed trivial. I had sworn my unending love to someone. I had sworn my unending love to a man whom I thought would never love me back. But in my fourth year, things changed once more. I met a girl, who was actually Harry's God sister, and we became best friends. She understood me and my futile love, because she had a case of her own. I slowly, mind you very slowly, began to come out, I figured out who I was in my fourth year. I realized I wasn't just little Ginny anymore. I wasn't just the youngest Weasley. I was Ginny Weasley, red headed, shy and quiet, but quick witted and smart mouthed. As Grace had said once, I was uniquely me. And that's all I could ever ask to be. I dated that year, I went out with Ravenclaw's and Hufflepuff's and a few Gryffindor's. I had promised to love Harry forever, but that didn't mean I couldn't have fun, even if I didn't love those guys.  
  
Fifth year. I never thought that year would come to tell you the truth. Grace and I were inseperable, we still are, and that summer had been torture. Of course Grace and I were always together, but it wasn't quite the same as always being together. When at school, we ate, drank, turned pages, wrote words, spoke, even breathed in unison. We were kind of pathetic. When we did start school back, the unthinkable happened. Harry Potter kissed me, I thought it was a dream for nearly a week. We had been up late and he was helping me study for Defense Against The Dark Arts, his best subject. We had stood and were staying good night, when he suddenly leaned over and kissed me. I floated up to my room, fireworks were still exploding three hours after it had happened. But after that he had avoided me. For a whole week I was either delusional or being ignored and niether were good. That saterday was a Hogsmead weekend and Grace and I were planning on going together as usual, fending off the boys, but Harry had something else in mind for me. He approched me that friday looking nervous and a little scared. He appologized for avoiding me for the previous week and in one very rushed sentence asked "WodyouliktogotoHogsmeadwithme?". I hadn't understood a word of it. He took a deep breath and asked again. So began the relationship of Harry Potter and Ginny Weasley. For Hogwarts, our relationship was almost as unforgetable as Ron and Hermione's was, and that was saying something.  
  
During Harry's seventh year, I was scared. I was really scared. I knew he was going to do something stupid, I just knew it, and he wouldn't tell me what. And what was worse, he had Faith, his other God sister, in on it. Oh, along with my brother and Hermione. Yes, they were all in on something and Harry had ordered them not to tell me. Ha. Too bad I have inside sources and Grace can deny me nothing I ask. It's what best friends are for after all. I think he thought I would stop him, and he was right. I would have stopped him had there been some other way, but there was no other way. I cried endlessly the night I found out, but I didn't stop him. He knew I knew though. I had come downstairs, with this vacent look, and he knew. And he just held me. Those were the best times, the ones when I didn't have to think, all I had to do was let him hold me.  
  
In the end it came. In the end HE came, and I did my part. I fought, and I pushed Harry as far from my mind as I could, which I must admit, wasn't far. I had never thought I could take a life, but when it was for Harry, there wasn't much I couldn't do, and even less that I wouldn't. When I woke up in the hospital wing a few days after Hogwarts was attacked, Harry was beside me, just waking up as well. He had a burn across his cheek and two black eyes. His arm was bandaged and his shoulder was in a sling because he had strained it. His leg was temporarily in a cast, but he was alive. And he was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen. I believe I started having hysterics at that point in time because Madam Pomfrey came in and gave me something, but as I went to sleep, Harry was grinning at me.  
  
My seventh year was nothing special. The astronomy tower was rebuilt (a dragon had knocked it down) and we had a ball. Harry came back for that. Nothing really happened to me until I was nineteen. I don't know if he was giving me a year to get settled, or giving himself a year to recouperate and a year to get settled, but when I was nineteen, he propsed. It was beautiful, in a "he's a bumbling idiot" sort of way. He dropped the ring into the stream, then had kittens because it had been his mother's, then realized he could just summon it. It was adorable. We were married six months later. He had just turned twenty-one and I was two and half months from turning twenty. Four months later we were expecting our first child and they just seemed to keep coming. Of course, that's nothing new, since I am a Weasley.  
  
So who am I? I am sister-in-law to seven women whom I love and love me. I am sister to six annoying brothers, who are good for a few things. I am the daughter of two wonderful people who love me despite all my faults. I am a mother of three beautiful little girls and two boys who act just like their father. I am the wife of a man that there will never be another of. A lot of people might listen to me remenise and think that Harry made me who I am today. But in all reality, I made me. I chose to make Harry a part of my life, I chose to make my life part of his. Every decision I made, I made on my own, despite the consiquences. And I don't regret a single one of them.  
  
"Are you coming to be coming to bed anytime soon, darling? Or do I need to carry you?" Harry's voice flows to my ears and I whisper; "Not as long as I live, understand?"  
  
Author's Note: Mucho thanks to my parents for not kicking my off and telling me to go to bed until after this was finished. And thank you to Sean for putting up with my damned fetishes and not trying to knock some sense into me. You are greatly appriciated, despite the fact that you think you aren't. 


End file.
